


Damnation Alley

by glinda4thegood



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-31
Updated: 2011-01-31
Packaged: 2017-10-15 11:19:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glinda4thegood/pseuds/glinda4thegood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finding human grace at Camp Chitaqua</p>
            </blockquote>





	Damnation Alley

  
  
  
  
**Entry tags:**   
|   
[castiel](http://glinda4thegood.livejournal.com/tag/castiel), [meg](http://glinda4thegood.livejournal.com/tag/meg), [supernatural](http://glinda4thegood.livejournal.com/tag/supernatural)  
  
---|---  
  
_**FIC: Supernational: Damnation Alley**_  
Title: **Damnation Alley**  
Author: **Glinda**  
Rating: **NC17**  
Pairing: Castiel/Meg (2014)  
Timeline: The End  
Summary: Finding human grace at Camp Chitaqua

  
Armour plated angel, motor-pony express  
Going down Damnation Alley  
It's one hell of a mess  
\- HAWKWIND: Damnation Alley

  
During the first few months as they settle and fortify the camp, they often find caravans and small encampments outside the hot zones as they patrol. Joking, they call the area around Kansas City _Damnation Alley_ after an old story Chuck tells them one night around the campfire.

After the first year of operation, stragglers on Damnation Alley either go to ground in other strongholds, turn or die.

Dean lays down a firm, inflexible policy. No one new is allowed in the camp without his permission. After the first year, most of the stragglers who appear at the gates are warned once, then shot. The smell of roasting meat as incendiaries follow these shots permanently alters dietary habits of many of the camp's inhabitants.

Cas finds red meat no longer calls to his appetites.

The sound of a single shot rouses him from an afternoon of dreaming. Beads rustle against each other as he stands just outside his open cabin door. Charcoal smudges blot the last light of sunset from the horizon. Another day gone. Another long night ahead. His life is a tedious, endless procession of empty eternities.

"Cas! Hey Cas!" Chuck bustles up the path. "Dean wants you down at the main gate. Can you walk?"

"Yes." He is no longer high, although he could be, given another few minutes of solitude. "Did they shoot another croat?"

"I'm not sure." Chuck jogs nervously beside him. "Someone said there was a group at the gate."

This hasn't happened in a long time. Word spreads quickly to the other strongholds. Stay away from Camp Chitaqua. Stay away from Dean Winchester. There are easier ways to find death in this world.

The full patrol force ranges around the camp's perimeter. Dean stands near the massive iron gate talking with one of his thugs, a huge man Cas doesn't know.

"Cas." Dean gives him an impatient look. "I need you to look this bunch over. Delaney Stronghold sent them. Delaney is having water and sanitation issues right now, couldn't take them in."

"And you just signed a mutual help pact with Delaney, so you have to do the right thing." Cas nods. He pretends not to notice Dean's gesture of disgust. "You told them the procedure? Did you shoot one?"

"It was just a warning." Dean shouts through the iron grill. "One at a time, come into the light, then stop until I give the word to approach."

There are ten of them in all. Ten dirty, ragged, wretched human creatures who have somehow managed to avoid the virus. Cas passes them, one by one. When the eighth human stumbles into the light he looks her over carefully, risking a side glance at Dean. She is covered with dirt and fresh mud. A ragged bit of cloth plasters over her forehead and hair.

"Well?" Dean asks impatiently. "Do I need to gank it?"

"No." Cas passes the last two. They file past him through the door. "I'll help Chuck get them settled in the quarantine cabins."

Dean nods. "We're leaving on patrol. Keep an eye on them for the next couple of hours. You know what to do."

Cas knows.

Chuck is already organizing placement of the newcomers. The small, intense man is the real angel in this empty world, Cas thinks. Chuck's team is expert at this routine: quick medical triage, shower and bathroom facilities, clean clothes. Food would be next, then hard camp cots with clean linen. Cas remembers seeing facial expressions at this point in the process that rival expressions he has seen in Heaven.

"Chuck, I'll take care of that one."

She lags behind the others, following by instinct.

"You sure she's clean?" Chuck frowns. "She doesn't look good."

"I'll take care of her," Cas repeats.

Chuck shrugs. "Get what you need from Barbara." He takes a closer look at the woman. "Did you know her?"

"Probably not."

Cas gets a bundle of clean clothes and simple medical supplies from their self-proclaimed camp nurse. "Send someone to my cabin with food when they serve."

"For two?" Barbara looks at him critically. "You haven't been eating enough."

"Please."

She still stands in line outside the med cabin.

"You need to follow me." Cas motions with his hand. "Come with me."

There is no response. Her eyes stare at the ground.

One step closer. He risks a swift touch on her arm. "You need to come with me, now."

Something in her face flinches, although her body remains rock steady. Her foot lifts, she takes one more step forward as the line moves.

"Please," Cas whispers. "Meg. You need to come with me."

  
She follows him to the cabin, like a zombie. Cas finds enormous relief when he gets her inside. Any of the camp's inhabitants are bound to reach the wrong conclusion about her present state of health.

He throws the bathroom door wide and keeps an eye on her as he fills the tub, a luxury few of the cabins enjoy. She stands in the center of the cabin's living area and stares at nothing.

"You can wash, then I'll take a look at those cuts." Deep cuts, Cas can tell, from the way crusted fabric sticks to her arms and legs.

She doesn't move.

Cas takes her arm and guides her to the bathroom. She goes without hesitation, but also without any indication of real awareness. He undresses her as gently as he can, wincing when fabric rips scabs away from her skin. He has to lift first one leg, then the other to get her into the tub. She stands for a moment, then shivers and lets herself sink into the water.

Cas washes her skin with the semi-liquid soap his harem makes for him. When the water in the tub turns brown, he drains it off, refills the tub and continues washing. He leaves her hair for last, carefully soaps, then rinses it with water he pours from a cup. It's shorter now, hacked off at the nape of her neck.

Again, he drains and refills the tub, and starts to work on patches that needed time to soak. When he helps her out and wraps her in a bath sheet, her skin is no longer the white he remembers. Her face is brown with sun and weather. Her body is a topographical map of cuts and bruises, old and new. A scar puckers her skin high on the left shoulder, a bullet wound with matching exit scar on her back.

He sits her on his bed and starts to work on the cuts. All need cleaning and salve; most need bandages. Some should have had stitches long ago. Cas does the best he can with butterflies. She doesn't make a sound, although Cas knows there should be pain and response. Ugly sepia, green and purple bruises discolor her inner thighs and in back above her knees. No skin is broken here, so Cas avoids these places.

The clean fleece shirt hangs from her thin shoulders. Cas has to draw the waistband tight and roll up the legs on the pants.

A voice calls from his door. Dee brings them a tray with soup and bread. Once upon a kinder time she was a school teacher. Now she helps with the handful of camp children. Dee is one of what Dean calls the Frequent Flyer Club. She puts the food on the small table in the living area.

"Shall I stay and help?" Her offer is clear.

"No thank you, Dee."

Cas leads Meg to the table. She sits automatically. He has to spoon the thick soup to her lips, but after the first taste she accepts the food. Halfway through the bowl she shakes her head, no more. Cas places the tray outside the cabin door, then finds two glasses and a bottle of camp 'shine. He pours two drinks and places one in front of her.

"Meg? How much do you remember?" He lets the raw spirit fill his mouth and slide down his throat, then pours another. "Where did she leave you?"

Her fingers close around the glass. She drinks, then holds the glass toward the bottle. He fills it half full. Her eyes seem almost purple pansy brown, but Cas thinks it must be an illusion. Purple smudges define her eyelids and circles under her eyes. Another refill, and she looks around the cabin, but not at him.

"How much do you remember?" He asks again. "I know what rode your body. I know it's gone. You must be very resilient, to still be alive. Especially now."

She gestures with her empty glass. He refills it.

"My name isn't Meg. I remember you." Her voice still has that oddly slurred, imprecise diction he remembers from the joint raid against Crowley. "She thought about you a lot."

She doesn't offer him her body's name. Cas pours himself another drink, and the bottle is empty. He finds a pre-rolled joint next to his bed and lights it, pulling sweet smoke deep into his lungs. He offers it to her, and she takes it quickly from his hand. They share until the last scrap of paper burns up against Cas' fingers.

"That's better." Lines smooth away in her face. She finally looks him in the eyes. "She would have liked to see you this way."

"Where did she leave you?" he asks again.

It takes her a moment to answer. Coordinating between thought and speech has obviously not been done in some time.

"Mass exorcism somewhere in California. Just after the virus really started to spread."

She runs her fingers through the short, black hair, nearly dry now. Cas sees strands of white against her temples.

"One of those organized religious warrior groups. I got --" she makes a noise that might be a laugh, "I got lucky and must have fallen through the floor to a sub-basement in the place they trapped us. The building was torched. I woke up and crawled out the next day."

She looks around the cabin. "Pretty sweet set-up. What did you do with that bread?"

Cas retrieves the small loaf from the tray outside. He twists it into two pieces and offers her the larger portion. He watches her eat. "So you remember her? You remember the things that happened while she rode you?"

"Enough. I remember enough." She smiles, a twisted gesture.

Cas feels a strange sensation work against his high. "She thought about me?"

"Yeah. It was one of the few understandable pieces of her I could tap into. Sick stalker bitch," she says with something almost like affection. "You -- startled her, when you kissed her. I don't think they usually remember, don't usually feel shit the same way . . ." She looks at him, frowns. "When nothing is wrong, nothing is forbidden, pleasures are fewer, less -- sharp. It's why they have to get off on all the torture and death. Demons can't get off on subtle, simple human pleasures."

She laughs. Cas thinks the sound is terrible.

"I think you might have been in that skin long enough to understand the thrill humans get from doing things they don't believe they _should_ be doing. Fucking married men, or their wives. Stealing. Getting high," Meg closes her eyes, remembering. "Running from the law. To name only a few, lesser "thou shalt nots". You made her remember how good the forbidden can be. She started to _crave_ that feeling. It made her hungry. Made her angry."

Cas finds there is nothing he can say. He understands, all too well, what her words mean.

"Did I see Dean WInchester at the gate?" she asks. "I've been -- out of it for a while. You got anything harder than pot around here?"

"Yes. Dean is in charge of the camp." Something twists and stabs inside him, pain and loss on a scale he can't quantify. "Sorry, booze and pot is all the cupboard will stretch to," he lies easily.

"I'll take what you can give me when I go." She raises her eyebrows at his involuntary movement. "Can't stay here, angel boy. WInchester will shoot me first, ask questions after. I know it, you know it."

He knows it. Dean is hard and unyielding now. There is barely a flicker left of the precious thing Cas has come, too late, to see in humans. Their grace. So different from angel grace, nearly as powerful, infinitely more fragile.

"I know. You can get a safe night's sleep, and a few supplies. I'll pass you through the front gate when he won't be around."

She nods, shortly, and looks away toward the bed. "So. You want to fuck?"

He wants to cry. "That won't be necessary. Take the bed and get some sleep."

"Angel boy can't get it up?" Her voice lacks cruelty. She sounds merely curious. "She never thought there would be a chance to jump your bones. The way she felt kind of left a residue. I haven't wanted to fuck in a long time. It might be -- satisfying -- to get something she never could."

For a moment he sees the skein of twisting threads that lead to this place, this moment, and hears Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos jeer. He stands and offers his hand. She ignores the gesture, passes him to get to the bed.

She strips off her pants and lays down, legs open. Cas closes his eyes and, for the first time in two years, prays.

"Not like that." He removes her sweatshirt, his own clothing. "You said you wanted something she could never have."

He touches her skin. Scars, half-healed cuts, bruises pass under his mouth. Her thin body remains rigid against his exploration. Her breasts are no larger than a young girl's now, shrunken against her ribs. Nipples rise, hard against his tongue; it is the first sign she is not indifferent.

She takes a sharp breath when he touches her thighs. Pain, not pleasure. Cas barely grazes the skin with his hand, finding her warm and wet enough when his fingers gently part her legs. He delays the kiss. It is simpler to concentrate on her body.

"Why don't you kiss me?" her voice still lacks perceptible emotion.

He is hard now, a miracle. "I don't think you want that." Cas places himself between her legs and finds that, wet as she is, entry isn't easy. She stiffens, but does not make a sound. She's been hurt, and that could make the success of his gift a challenge. He moves slowly, using one hand between them with care. He fits her better now; she is still tight, but so much wetter. Her face turns away, transforming the sharp line of jaw and neck into a line drawing of her face. Cas kisses her throat, her ear lobe, the corner of her mouth.

She takes a breath, moves uncontrollably. He continues, rhythmic, slow strokes. She arches under him, finally pushing back. "That's what she wanted. Oh god, that's exactly what she wanted." Her arms come around his back, her legs follow. "Harder."

He finds his body wants to do just that. Deeper, harder strokes with her pelvis tight against him threaten to distract him from the final goal. She makes raw, inarticulate sounds Cas cannot categorize. _Pain? Pleasure? Grief?_

"There. There," she says through clenched teeth. "I'm almost there. Harder, angel boy. Harder . . ."

She comes with only a small whimper, but her entire body stiffens in a spasm that threatens to crack his ribs when her knees lock against his sides. Cas lets her come down, then brings himself over the edge with a single, final thrust. He keeps his eyes on her face. She is transfixed with pleasure, transfixed at the sight of him coming. He sees it in her then, the fading ember of her human grace.

Cas kisses her. Her mouth does not move as the other's mouth had. She doesn't have the ego and self-assurance of the other. She doesn't have the same hungers. Cas meets her tongue, feels the moan of pleasure echo between their mouths. There is nearly nothing left of his power, but he wills all he can find of his former self to locate the ember and gently breathe it to greater life.

"Bastard. You bastard." She pushes him off her body, rolls to put her back toward him. Her shoulders shake with silent tears. "Fucking bastard."

"Be careful what you wish for." There is a universe of understated loss in his words. "I'll wake you up before morning."

He wakes her an hour before sunrise. They smoke a joint and Cas gives her some of his precious pills. They walk to the gate without subterfuge. Cas tells the guard she's going back to the Delaney compound, and there are no awkward questions. No one really cares.

Her slim form disappears quickly into the darkness, headed toward Damnation Alley.

Cas has been there. He wonders when the patrol will roll that way again.

~ ~ ~

[castiel_files](http://community.livejournal.com/castiel_files/)


End file.
